


To Be Edgeless Again

by messageredacted



Series: To be edgeless again [1]
Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan), Dark Knight (2008)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-14
Updated: 2012-01-14
Packaged: 2017-10-29 13:00:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/320161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/messageredacted/pseuds/messageredacted
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Batman is a vigilante who pursues justice and never kills. Bruce Wayne is a serial killer who has his own means of handing out justice. And the Joker is his newest victim…</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Be Edgeless Again

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written on 19 March 2010.

_to make of a small joy  
obsession  
to pull from the fruit all the pulp until the bitter comes  
and then that too_  
—[“Letter to my lover's stalker”](http://www.indiefeedpp.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=383507) by Marty McConnell

 **1\. hunt**

The corpse is split down the center like an autopsy. The red line makes a Y at the neck, the triangle of skin pulled up and over the victim’s face, hiding the place where the neck has been split. Down the stem of the Y, the skin is pulled apart like a pair of curtains opened to let the light in.

The ribs, cracked at the sternum, have been pulled back on either side like a bear trap set to spring. Everything inside is left intact, cooling in the brisk spring air of the alley.

Gordon wipes his hand over his forehead and sighs, trying not to look too closely at the corpse. He isn’t going to lose his lunch over this one. Not with the press here, their cameras rolling from behind the police cordon. There are dozens of people behind held back by the police, all of them straining for a look. At least the killer seems to prefer dark, narrow alleys.

“Is the tooth missing?” asks a voice behind him. Gordon doesn’t even turn. He’d been waiting.

“Yes,” he says, shooing away the crime scene photographer. Batman steps out of the shadows behind him and joins him at the body. “It’s just like all the others.”

Batman doesn’t make any response. The sun is just starting to lighten to sky to the east. Floodlights have been set up on either end of the alley to throw some light onto the scene. It makes the corpse look like a horror movie, even more so than it normally would.

“We got a footprint out of the mud in the gutter,” Gordon adds. “But I don’t think we’ll get anything off it. People pass through this alley all the time.”

“Maybe someone saw something, then,” Batman replies.

That would certainly be a change. This is the fourteenth such murder in eighteen months and there have been no sightings, no clues, no hints. Certainly there have been plenty of tips called in by anonymous callers, but that’s more likely due to the media frenzy. If this wasn’t a big case, Gordon wouldn’t be here. Police Commissioner has its low points, but at least he doesn’t have to roll out of bed for the average homicide anymore.

“They’re canvassing the area now,” Gordon says. “The victim had ID this time. Tony Carceri.”

“I know the name,” Batman says. “A mob enforcer.”

“Fits the profile. Our boy only goes after the repeat offenders,” Gordon replies with a shrug. He pauses, then goes with it. “Speaking of which, I hear the Joker’s being—”

He glances over his shoulder. The alley is empty, as usual. Gordon grimaces.

“—released,” he finishes to himself, turning back to the corpse.

##

The front gates of Arkham Asylum are more ornamental than functional. One you’ve gotten past the barbed wire fences and the armed guards, a fancy wrought iron fence isn’t going to keep you inside. Still, when the gate pulls all the way open and the street lays beyond, open in front of him, the Joker feels as if he’s taken the first truly clean breath of fresh air in three years.

The guard gestures and he makes himself step forward, out of the asylum grounds and onto the sidewalk. There is a car waiting, his parole officer sitting in the driver’s seat. Otherwise, no one seems to be paying much attention to the whole affair.

When his foot touches the sidewalk, he almost expect something to happen. Gunshots, maybe. An explosion. Another gate, slamming down. Instead, the guards shut the gate behind him and he’s out. That’s it.

“You look nervous,” says the parole officer, whose name the Joker vaguely remembers is Alex. He’s pretty sure he looks nothing of the sort, but he doesn’t respond. Alex must say that to everyone.

“Get in. I’ll take you to the halfway house.” Alex gets out of the car and opens the back seat door.

The Joker circles the car to the front passenger’s side door, trailing his fingers over the paint. There is a faint film of dust and road salt on the car, leaving white powder on his fingertips. He pulls open the door and gets in.

Alex slams the back door shut and gets back into the driver’s seat without commenting. The car smells like cigarettes. The Joker rolls down his own window to let in the tepid breeze. Alex reaches into his pocket and takes out a pack of gum. He takes one for himself and then offers it to the Joker, who stares at it until Alex puts it back in his pocket.

“I can see how you passed your interview,” Alex says dryly, starting the car.

It’s going to be a warm day. The sky is cloudless for the first time in weeks, or maybe it was just being in Arkham that made everything seem gray. Alex pulls away from the curb and into the traffic on the street. The Joker wipes dusty fingers on the worn knee of his trousers. They’re the same clothes he was arrested in, three years ago.

This isn’t the same world he left. He can read it somehow in the comfortable weight of Alex’s hands on the steering wheel and the swing of the arms of the pedestrians as they walk down the street. He can see it in the way the thin sunlight warms the faded streets. This is a city that has come through its illness, shaken and skinny but alive. Whatever disease this city had when the Joker was free last, it’s gone now.

“There’s an envelope for you on the back seat,” Alex says. They’re driving past Gotham General, which has been entirely rebuilt. The Joker stares at the freshly painted brick. Healed, just like it never happened.

He unbuckles his seat belt and then leans over the back of his seat and grabs the manila envelope. He sits back down and opens it. There’s a list of telephone numbers inside, people he can call if life outside of Arkham gets too difficult, or if he has any trouble. As if they’re really here to help him instead of protect the populace from him.

“I’m going to check in with you on Monday,” Alex says, pulling up to the curb. They’re in front of a three story walkup. A few men are smoking cigarettes on the front stoop. Alex parks. “Benny will meet you inside and show you where you will be staying. And please, be here when I show up, okay? We don’t want to get this started on the wrong foot.”

The Joker gets out of the car and shuts the door without answering, holding the manila envelope. There is a bulge in the bottom of the envelope. He reaches in and takes out a small, cheap cellphone.

“What is this?” he says through the open window of the car.

“He’ll be calling you,” Alex says, shifting out of park.

“Who?” the Joker asks, but Alex is already driving away.

##

The television screens cycle automatically through a collection of different security cameras in Gotham, but Bruce Wayne has his attention fixed on one. He can see the street outside the front of the brick building where the men are smoking cigarettes. He can see the car pull up to the curb and the Joker climb out and take the cell phone out of the envelope.

When the car leaves, the Joker stands on the sidewalk for just a few seconds longer before he turns away. Instead of going up the front steps of the house, he melts away into the street, his head down, disappearing into a nearby alley.

 _That’s right,_ thinks Bruce, beginning to smile. _Run._

He switches to a different security camera and catches the Joker just as he emerges from the alley. There are a quarter of a million security cameras in Gotham, and he has access to every one of them. He has access to a lot of things now. After his stunt with the ultrasonic cell phones that he used to catch the Joker three years ago, he’s found other ways of monitoring the city. Of course, this time he’s sure not to let Lucius Fox know about it.

His newest project has brought him back to cell phones. He got the idea from a project that the NSA had been working on. They can listen to conversations held within range of any cellphone, whether or not that phone is even on. He elaborated on that. With a computer algorithm that has memorized the patterns of the Joker’s voice (or any voice he has it analyze) he can triangulate the Joker’s position in the city within minutes of the Joker opening his mouth. It’s not as visually thrilling as the ultrasonic device, but it’s incredibly effective.

The Joker pauses by a Dumpster and shakes the cell phone out of the envelope. He flips through the contacts list for a moment, but of course he won’t find any clues in there. The phone is brand new and clean of any information.

Bruce reaches out to the phone on his desk and dials the number. He watches the screen for the moment the cell phone starts to ring in the Joker’s hand. The Joker, to his credit, does not flinch. Instead, after a hesitation, he tosses it into the back of the Dumpster and moves on. Bruce lets it ring and ring.

##

There are certain rituals that must be observed.

They have to have an address on file for you before they let you go, so there’s the halfway house. There will be a room in there for him, a bed to sleep on and a comfortable routine to follow, but he has never been one for comfortable routines.

You need a job, and they have a few pre-arranged ones that are willing to take on violent offenders. Grocery store stockers, dish washers, construction workers. Minimum wage jobs that are meant to give you honest work until you can get back on your feet. Of course, the Joker has no name and no social security number, which was a problem for them all at first. There are laws about this sort of thing. Without a name, he could not be charged with a crime, and so all of his court records list him as John Doe. The room at the halfway house is in that name as well. He has no social security number yet, and so he has no job, but he never had any intention of taking one anyway.

You have to have emotional connections to people, so there’s the parole officer with his friendly offer of gum; the halfway house counsellors with their hospitality; the list of phone numbers in the envelope.

The people at Arkham have been in the prison business for a long time and they know what’s needed. Everything is down to a formula. Maybe it doesn’t work for everyone but it works for most.

It’s not going to work for him, though, and here’s why: he knows this is a trap. He’s seen it coming since they first took him aside and said ‘you’re going to get your hearing’ and then ‘they approved you for parole’. He was put in Arkham with no chance of parole. He served _three goddamn years_ for killing _nineteen people_. When they sat him in the room, the parole board in a neat little row in front of him, and they asked him “How have you changed?” he told them to go fuck themselves. And he _still got parole._

He knows it’s a trap. They know he knows. The entire thing is a ridiculous farce. When they gave him that phone, he knew what this was. Someone with a lot of influence got him out of Arkham. They have plans for him.

But, as he said. He’s not a big one for plans.

##

The corpses all have a few things in common when you line them up next to each other, Batman has found. First, they are all criminals. There isn’t one of them who hasn’t committed some heinous crime and gotten away with it. They’re the ones the law can’t touch, the ones with the pull to keep the law off their backs. The ones where there isn’t quite enough evidence to convict.

Second, the ones of them with friends and family say that they knew they were being hunted. They were paranoid in their last weeks. They felt someone was watching them. They reported being haunted by their crimes, finding pictures and newspaper articles in strange places.

Third, the coroner has found locks of hair missing from each victim. The missing hair isn’t freshly cut; it’s at least a few days old. So they were _still alive_ when the hair was cut. This is the part that gives Batman the chills. These men were touched by the killer long before they were killed by him, and it’s likely they never even knew it.

Fourth, they are missing teeth. Just before death, the killer takes a molar from each of them. This, Batman feels, is the trophy of the kill. It serves as a memento.

He has mentally divided these stages of the kill into four different parts, and has given each one of them a name. First, the hunt, where the victim knows they are being watched. Second, the touch, where the killer meets the victim personally and takes the lock of hair. Third, the awakening, where the victim is made to understand that they are being hunted due to their past crimes. And fourth, the put down, where the victim is killed and the tooth removed.

This is what he knows about the killer, and it is the only thing he knows. The killer leaves no other clues. Batman is beginning to suspect that the killer is a ghost. It’s almost as if he doesn’t even exist.

He wakes up in the chair in front of his computers. The screens are all off and feels as if he must have been sleeping there a few hours, although the last thing he remembers was coming into the bat cave as the sun was rising, after finding the latest victim of the serial killer. That was eight hours ago.

He rubs at the crick in his neck and gets up to jog around the room for a little while. He does five hundred sit-ups and another five hundred crunches, working up a good sweat, then takes a cold shower in the shower stall built into the far side of the bat cave, where he also has a toilet and a cot.

Afterwards, awake and refreshed, he returns to the computers and shuts them off, then heads for the lift to take him back up into the rebuilt mansion. He’s been drifting away from his technology use lately. There’s nothing more satisfying than going out into the city and watching from the rooftops, ready to leap into action wherever he’s needed. He can listen to the police band radio through his headset there and make it to crime scenes before the police even do.

As the lift rises, he looks up at the approaching ceiling. Gordon had said something about the Joker being released from Arkham today. He hadn’t meant to sleep as long as he did. He wanted to be there, to make sure that the Joker didn’t disappear into the woodwork. If the killer was after criminals who hadn’t been properly punished for their crimes, the Joker was certainly one of them. Everyone knew it was a little strange that the Joker was being released on parole after three years in Arkham. That must really infuriate the killer, assuming the killer wasn’t already annoyed by the fact that the Joker had gotten an easy sentence in Arkham for mental incompetence rather than the death sentence in Blackgate he should have gotten.

Now there’s a thought. The lift reaches his floor but Batman stays where he is, staring into space. He’d been thinking that the Joker might be a good target for the killer because of his early release, but what if the killer were actually behind his release? That would be a change from the routine—none of the other victims were actually in prison when the killer targeted them. Perhaps he should look into who exactly got the Joker out of Arkham. There has to be some clue there.

##

There’s no doubt about it: the city has changed since the Joker was here last. He used to know the dark parts, the places where you could find someone to do a job for you. He used to know them likes the backs of his hands, but now they’re gone. Cleaned up. It’s like the tables have turned and now the criminals are running scared, where the authorities once did.

He spends time walking through the city, and then when the afternoon grows late he sits on the subway and rides it around and around. He wears a baseball cap that he picked up on his travels and most people don’t really look at his face. The one or two who do tend to get off the subway at the very next station.

Afternoon segues into evening and the car fills with commuters. The Joker doesn’t move from his seat. People crowd into the car, jostling to fill the tiny space. Everyone braces themselves as the train pulls from the station.

A cell phone rings and a woman digs into her purse to get it out. She puts the phone to her ear. “Hello?” There is a quick pause and then the woman huffs, annoyed. “John Doe? Are you kidding me? Of course you have the wrong number.”

The Joker glances up at her. She snaps her phone shut and shoves it into her bag and then, further down the car, another cell phone rings.

He can’t hear the conversation but he sees the man frown and hang up. The third phone rings as they’re pulling into the station and he’s the first one off the train.

He doesn’t even pay any attention to what subway station he’s in. He takes the stairs to the street and then shoves his way out into the early evening air. The sun is setting and the streets are filled and next to him, a telephone rings.

He shoves his hands in his pockets and strides down the sidewalk, trying not to break into a run. It’s the clothes. It has to be the clothes. They gave him these clothes and the cell phone and he knew that the cell phone was bugged; it had to be. But he hadn’t even thought about the clothes. He needs to get rid of them.

It’s been a few years since he last attempted to pick pockets, but he’s only a little rusty, and on the third try he gets a wallet. He takes out the cash and discards the wallet and credit cards, then steps into the first clothing store he comes to.

Forty bucks later, he has a set of clothing that just about fits. He leaves the store with his bag and then ducks into the fast food place next door and locks himself into the bathroom.

He yanks off his old coat and runs his fingers over the hem, looking for some sort of tracking device. Anything. There’s nothing there, but he balls it up and shoves it into the trash can anyway, then strips off the shirt and vest, giving them the same treatment.

In the hem of the pants, he finds a small metal button the size of a watch battery. He flushes it down the toilet and throws the pants and all the rest of his clothes away before dressing in the clothes he just bought.

When he has changed, he stares at himself in the mirror. The scars are always a problem. There are ways to hide them, and maybe he needs to find himself a theater supply store. That will be the next step. Perhaps he should cut off all his hair, or dye it another color.

No. He forcibly stops himself from that line of thinking. There are times when he gets…paranoid. Maybe there is someone out there looking for him. He doesn’t know who or why. But these precautions are good enough. No one’s going to be searching for him that hard.

##

 **2\. touch**

Bruce wears a tasteful gray suit when he takes the Italian supermodel out to dinner in the city. She laughs at all of his jokes and has a knack for coming up with obscene double entendres that make him laugh as well. Dinner goes long, and afterwards he takes her back to the penthouse apartment in the city, which he kept even though the reconstruction on Wayne Manor was complete.

When she sleeps, he showers and then dresses in dark clothing. He slips out of the building through his Batman exit and then takes one of his more subtle motorcycles into the Narrows. His PDA is blinking a location.

The location is an old factory by the docks, laughably close to Arkham Asylum. Bruce parks a few blocks away and then walks, wearing his motorcycle helmet.

He knows this city better than anyone else. It’s not just the time he spends as Batman, spiraling over it from high above like a vulture. It’s the time he spends like this, as Bruce Wayne, stalking prey, that gives him this knowledge.

Although maybe Batman does know a lot about the city. It’s getting harder and harder to remember what Batman knows.

The factory looms large against the night sky. Bruce slips inside silently, keeping his motorcycle helmet on. There is no sound inside the building and he makes none as he creeps down a narrow hallway. There are blind brick windows on either side of the hall that may have once looked into rooms full of machinery but now are haphazardly boarded.

Others have made this place a home over the years. He passes a pile of cardboard and rags where someone slept once. There is a dead pigeon on the sill of a window. It is nearly pitch black in here, but the visor of the motorcycle helmet has been modified to give him night vision, turning everything bright green.

He knows he’s on the right track when he finds a door that has been forced open and scuffs in the dust on the floor. He slips inside.

Something smashes down hard on his head and the only thing that saves him is the motorcycle helmet, which cracks. The night vision fuzzes and flickers out. He throws himself to the side and then kicks out, his foot connecting with something soft. Something clatters to the floor. Bruce kicks out again and then someone is on him, a knife punching through the leather of his biking jacket and narrowly avoiding cutting his flesh.

He slams his face forward and connects with his assailant’s face. For a second the night vision flickers on and he can see the Joker, blood leaking from his mouth and nose. Then the camera is gone again, but he smashes his head forward again and hears it connect a second time.

The Joker moves back, out of the way, but Bruce follows. They roll on the ground, crashing into some wooden piece of furniture. Bruce finds the Joker’s wrist and tries to wrench the knife out of his hand. The Joker slams a knee into Bruce’s ribs and the air goes out of him. He smashes their faces together one last time and the Joker goes suddenly limp.

Bruce pulls the knife from the Joker’s slack fingers. He is breathing hard inside of his helmet and he can feel something hot trickling down his temple, either blood or sweat.

He is shockingly, achingly hard. He hasn’t been this aroused in a long time, not even for the Italian supermodel. Of course, she hadn’t let him wrestle her for control of a knife. Maybe he should suggest that next time.

He pushes up the visor of the helmet and reaches out, touching his gloved fingers to the Joker’s face. He takes his hand away and pulls off the glove, then returns again, running his fingers lightly over the Joker’s cheekbone and eyelid. The Joker is completely unconscious. One of his cheeks is already hot and swollen.

This is the best part of the ritual. He’s not usually this aroused but there is always an incredible high when he has his victim within reach, asleep or drugged unconscious. He could finish the deed now but that wouldn’t be right. No, he needs to make his mark and then leave. Give the quarry time to understand the true depth of the situation.

He reaches out and grabs a hank of the Joker’s hair and saws through it with the knife, not caring if he accidentally cuts into the Joker’s face. The hair is soft. He twists it around his finger, then slides it into his pocket.

He pulls the helmet off his head and leans forward in the darkness until his face is close to the Joker’s. The Joker is breathing slowly and evenly. He touches his mouth to the soft skin just under the Joker’s ear, then breathes in the smell of industrial shampoo and soap and sweat.

The ridge of the Joker’s scar touches his cheek. He moves his head slowly and kisses the point where the scar begins, then traces it with his tongue to the corner of the Joker’s mouth. He slips his tongue in between the slack lips and kisses him slowly.

His heartbeat is ratcheting up and he can hear himself breathing shallowly. Normally by this time he would be long gone with his trophy, but right now he can’t tear himself away. Desire is pooling behind his teeth and inside his chest.

No, he can’t do it. He can’t hold himself back. Bruce’s hand jumps to the front of his pants and he unzips himself, letting out his straining erection. He jacks himself roughly until, with a strangled noise, he ejaculates onto the Joker’s stomach. It was fast and unsatisfying but if he waited much longer he was going to take more than he had been prepared for, and that would have ruined the entire ritual.

He zips himself back up and then staggers to his feet. He needs to get out of here. It’s getting late, and if he waits too long, _he_ will show up.

Outside of the factory, he sucks in air like a drowning man. He gets onto the motorcycle and starts it back for the city and the penthouse.

He wakes up the Italian supermodel for some enthusiastic lovemaking and afterwards, lying sweaty together, she says it was the best she ever had. He kisses her and agrees but inside he wonders what it would have been liked if he had given in.

##

 **3\. awaken**

Batman wakes up while slicing a bagel for breakfast in the kitchen.

He stops slicing, looking down at his hands, then up at the kitchen, which is the kitchen of the penthouse and not the manor. There is someone in the shower; he can hear the water running.

He methodically goes back over the last thing he remembers. Yes, there had been a date in his day planner for last night, although he can’t remember the woman’s name. Obviously it went well.

He has a throbbing headache, and when he reaches up to the top of his head, he can feel a knot there. He must have hit it on something. Is that why he can’t remember last night? That’s a symptom of a concussion, right? Perhaps he should talk to his doctor.

Except it’s getting a little harder to convince himself that this is the first time it’s happened. It’s not. Going back over the last few weeks, or months, or even the past year, he can see a regular pattern of holes in his memory. At first he thought he was just sleeping more. Then he thought perhaps it was just overwork. Now he’s not so sure.

The shower stops and a moment later a stunningly beautiful woman comes into the kitchen wrapped in a towel and nothing else. He gives her a kiss and she presses herself against him, obviously wanting more, but he politely ignores it.

“Bagel?” he offers, finishing cutting the bagel in half.

“A quarter of one,” she says, pulling away from him and looking disappointed. “I have a shoot in an hour. I don’t want to look fat.”

He puts the two halves of the bagel in the toaster and busies himself finding jam and butter in the fridge while trying to remember her name. As it turns out, it doesn’t really matter, because she leaves not too long after eating, and then he’s alone in the apartment.

He returns to the bedroom and finds his gray suit where he discarded it last night and searches the pockets. He finds nothing, so he keeps looking around the room.

Finally, unsatisfied, he closes up the penthouse and heads down to the garage. He has to get back to the Bat cave to work on tracking down the Joker. He’d had no luck yesterday in the time that he was able to spend on it.

He chooses the Lamborghini and backs out of the parking space, then hits the brakes. He can see one of his motorcycles in the next row of spaces. The helmet, hanging from the handles, has been cracked on the top as if it were hit by something heavy. Silently, he reaches up and touches the bump on the top of his head.

##

The Joker sits in a diner over a cup of coffee for four hours the next morning. He has a nasty black eye, but he keeps his head down and his baseball cap on and no one bothers him.

The place is only a little busy. A couple people sit in booths, and once in a while someone comes in for a takeout order. Except for the cook shouting out the names of the orders, the diner is quiet.

He’s not a moron. They were able to watch the news in Arkham and read newspapers when they earned the privilege. He knows about the killer that has been terrorizing the criminal underbelly of Gotham City. This isn’t a criminal like Batman, who stays strictly within the bounds of the law. This is a sick bastard who guts criminals like fish and doesn’t leave a trace behind.

It’s not surprising that he managed to catch the guy’s attention. Maybe even that’s why he’s out here instead of inside Arkham. The hunt isn’t as fun when your prey is already locked up.

He reaches up and fingers the shorn hairs over his left ear. The killer took it from him, and he isn’t going to let him get away with that. One way or another, they’re going to see this through to the end.

“John D.,” calls the cook, putting a greasy paper bag on the counter top. There aren’t any people waiting for a takeout order at the moment. The cook looks around. “John D?”

##

“Assistant District Attorney Rachel Dawes,” Bruce says out loud.

There’s a picture of her and Harvey in the newspaper today, front page, above the fold. It’s just about the three year anniversary of the Joker’s attacks on Gotham, and so it wasn’t difficult to suggest to the Gotham Times that they do a little retrospective. The evening news is going to list all of the victims.

“District Attorney Harvey Dent.”

He paces to his computer and watches the small blue dot that is the Joker move through his map of Gotham, away from the diner. On the run again.

“Police Commissioner Loeb.”

Where should he do the final deed? He likes to pick meaningful places. The place of the victim’s last crime, for instance. Maybe a childhood home. Should he choose the rebuilt Gotham General Hospital? Maybe the Prewitt Building, where he swung the Joker over the gap and pulled him back?

Maybe his own penthouse, where they met for the first time?

“Judge Sorillo.”

On the computer, the dot stops moving. Bruce reaches out and switches screens to the security cameras. The Joker has paused next to a newspaper vendor. Row after row of black and white pictures of Rachel and Harvey grin out from the stacks of newsprint. The Joker returns their gaze for a long moment before he moves on.

“Batman,” Bruce says.

##

There are other things. The Joker keeps walking, keeps moving, but wherever he turns there are hints. There are _I Believe in Harvey Dent_ posters plastered onto walls. The mannequin in the clothing store window the next block over is wearing his worn and faded purple suit, which must have been rescued from the bathroom trash can where he left it.

Maybe there are tracking devices implanted under his skin. Maybe all the people on the street are in on the joke. Maybe they’re watching him when he’s not looking, and they’re reporting back his location to the person in charge, whoever that is. This is not the first time he has believed this in his life, but it’s the first time since the medication.

There had been a counsellor—and this was not in Arkham, this was in a different time, when the Joker was a different person—who asked him logically why he thought there were people watching him. Why did these unseen stalkers even care about the Joker? Why him and no one else? What was so special about him?

“I’m memorable,” he had replied, and then he had laughed. And he is memorable. He has _one of those faces._

Maybe this is how Gotham has gotten out of its slump. They’re banding together to fight the bad guys. Groups of dog walkers and early morning joggers and women with baby carriages chasing down the criminals. Scores of cab drivers and street vendors going in for the kill. Group bonding through summary execution.

He stops in the middle of the sidewalk and turns around, trying to meet the gaze of the pedestrians streaming past him. They try to ignore him, going about their business. This is crazy talk. _Crazy_. And he’s not crazy.

 _Come and get me_ , he thinks.

##

It’s not that Batman was a victim of the Joker, although he was. He didn’t die, but he lost things that meant the world to him. Things that meant life to him. Humans have limits and Batman is human, despite everything.

It’s more that the Joker made him see those limits. Before the Joker, he was a man in a suit and after the Joker—well, he still is that, after all. Except something has broken and now the suit is Bruce Wayne’s body, and sometimes it is worn by the masked avenger, and sometimes it is worn by the serial killer. Masks within masks within masks.

Bruce Wayne doesn’t mourn the split. It sets him free.

##

 **4\. put down**

“He’s going to go after the Joker,” Batman says.

Gordon sits on the edge of the roof of City Hall, his elbows on his knees. Behind him, the night traffic is streaming past the building, horns honking and sirens wailing.

“How do you know?” Gordon asks.

“You’ve seen the newspapers. I think someone—” For a second, he falters, then: “I think he was let out of Arkham for a reason.”

“The killer would need a lot of influence to get that done,” Gordon says. “It would need to be someone on the inside, or someone with a lot of power.” His gaze is thoughtful.

 _Someone on the Board of Trustees, maybe_ , Batman thinks to himself. _Someone who has contacts in Arkham. Someone with billions of dollars to grease the wheels_. No, it’s impossible. He knows how impossible that is. His episodes are just due to stress.

“I want your men out there looking for him,” Batman says. “We need to put him in protective custody. Get him off the streets. He’s not safe, and if the killer sticks to the pattern, the attack could happen as soon as tonight.”

“What will you be doing?” Gordon asks.

 _Staying as far away from him as possible_ , Batman thinks. “Tracking down whoever let him out of Arkham.”

Gordon nods, accepting it. “I’ll let my men know.”

##

When the pay phone on the corner rings, the Joker answers it.

For most of the night, the stalking seemed to stop. It appears to go through phases, as if the stalker sometimes is taking a nap or has lost interest or maybe is busy doing something else, and then it picks up again. It’s getting close to dawn now and there hasn’t been anything for hours.

As soon as he lifts the phone to his ear, he hears the dial tone. He drops the phone back into its cradle and then leans against the wall by the phone, looking up and down the street. The sky is growing pale orange on the horizon. The cars on the streets are full of people in suits heading to work.

Down the block, someone’s cell phone rings. He turns his head and watches as the woman pulls the phone from her purse. As she answers it, he starts toward her.

He hasn’t quite reached her when, further down the street, another cell phone rings. He passes the woman and continues towards the second phone, and when the third rings even further down the street, he knows that this is a trail of bread crumbs. He breaks into a run.

Barely two blocks later, he catches the silhouette of the building in the distance and knows where this is headed. It’s the Prewitt Building, where construction has stalled, leaving it still the half-finished building it was. In the whole city, it’s the one place that hasn’t changed since he left.

He has a few knives on his person that he managed to filch during the night. Each one he hides in a different place on his body. If he’s being watched, he hopes that he managed to get at least one weapon past the stalker’s notice.

He reaches the building a few minutes later. It’s surrounded by a fence but there is a broken padlock on one of the entrances. He slips inside and then finds the glass doors of the building unlocked.

The place looks as if it has been abandoned by the construction crew. Everything is white with construction dust. There is no elevator in the shaft. He climbs the stairs, wondering if he’s going to have to go all the way to the top where he had been apprehended three years ago, but just four flights up, he finds a photograph of Rachel Dawes taped to the stairwell door. He pushes the door open.

Sheets of translucent white plastic hang down from the ceiling, blocking his view of much in the room. There’s a photograph of Harvey Dent attached to a split in the plastic. The lights are off but the room has a faint glow to it as the sun begins to rise, and he is able to see where he is going. He moves slowly, silently forward and reaches the gap in the plastic.

On the other side is more hanging plastic and more photos. He can tell where the photos are trying to lead him, but instead he pulls out a knife and cuts a hole in the plastic and steps through.

There is metal and wood framework here, marking the place where walls will be. He climbs through a wall, heading towards the next veil of plastic on the other side.

Somewhere to his left, out of sight, a foot scrapes the floor.

He keeps moving, holding his breath. When he reaches the plastic, he slits it silently, peering through. No one is on the other side. The footstep must have been further away, then. He cuts the plastic the rest of the way and steps through.

There is a faint metallic thwap and something bites his chest. He barely gets a second to glance down at the little prongs buried in his skin, attached by thin wires to a shadow standing fifteen feet down the plastic wall to his right, before the electricity flows through him and he lets out a shout, his vocal cords involuntarily contracting along with every other muscle in his body. He drops like a rock.

The shadow moves toward him, not making a sound. That scraping footstep was deliberate, then. It was a trap to draw his attention. His muscles are jelly and he can’t move when the shadow rolls him over onto his back and then yanks the prongs from his chest. The shadow is a man dressed in black, wearing a ski mask with holes for his eyes and mouth.

The man grabs his shoulders and then drags him down the plastic corridor to where the hallway turns. Beyond it is a large area cordoned off with the plastic. There is a table in the center with a coil of nylon cord on it. In the corner of the room, a laptop sits open with a map on the screen. A blue dot blinks steadily.

The man lifts the Joker up onto the table and ties one end of the cord to the Joker’s wrist before his muscles have a chance to recover from the jolt of electricity. He loops the cord under the table and then ties the other end to the Joker’s other wrist, pulling tight so that the Joker’s wrists are immobilized against the edges of the table. He moves down to the Joker’s legs and removes his shoes, then gives his ankles the same treatment.

“Who are you?” the Joker asks when his lips want to move again. The man quietly finishes tying his ankles.

“If you’re going to kill me, at least you could show me who you are,” the Joker tries.

“You’ve met me,” the man says. His voice is perfectly normal. He doesn’t seem to be attempting to disguise it, although the Joker can’t place the voice at all.

“I’ve met a lot of people.”

The man moves around the table and disappears out of the Joker’s range of vision. There is a clattering as if he is going through a tool box, and then he reappears with a pair of pliers.

“You’re not afraid, are you?” The man sounds curious. He pauses at the Joker’s side, his eyes studying the Joker’s face. “They’re usually afraid.”

This time it’s the Joker who doesn’t answer. After a pause, the man climbs up onto the table in one practiced motion. He swings a leg over the Joker’s lower body and straddles him.

The Joker stares up at him as the man plants one hand on the table right next to the Joker’s head. His other hand is holding the pliers, but at the moment he is just staring down at the Joker.

“I’m one of your victims,” the man says.

“I’ve met a lot of those, too,” the Joker replies.

The man smiles at that—even his eyes crinkle in his amusement. The Joker can see a row of perfect white teeth. The man brings up the pliers and forces them between the Joker’s lips, worming them down into the pocket between his cheek and teeth. The Joker keeps his teeth clamped tightly shut.

“You would know me if you saw me,” the man says mildly, sounding unconcerned. He shifts his weight back onto the Joker’s groin and lifts his other hand, clamping it on the Joker’s cheeks in the dip where his back teeth come together. He squeezes tightly, his grip iron and uncompromising. After a struggle of wills, the Joker’s teeth part and the man shoves the pliers in between his teeth.

He can feel the man getting hard against his stomach. The man’s breath is coming slightly faster as well. His eyes are fixed on the Joker’s mouth as he maneuvers the pliers around, getting a good grip on a back molar.

It takes a few minutes, but finally the man wrenches the tooth out of the Joker’s mouth. The tooth is coated in blood and the man lets out a shaky gasp as if it is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. He turns the tooth over, studying it, and then leans down, his erection pressing against the Joker, and kisses him.

All the Joker can taste is blood. The man is aggressive, pushing his tongue inside the Joker’s mouth and tasting the blood. When he pulls back, there is blood all over his mouth. He looks down at the Joker, his pupils blown wide with arousal. His expression is very serious.

For a moment they stare at each other. Then the man sits back and then visibly shakes off the serious look. He smirks at the Joker and pulls the tooth out of the pliers, then pops it into his mouth. The Joker sees the bulge where he tucks it into his cheek.

“I have a whole jar of these at home,” the man says, getting off the Joker.

He tosses the pliers back into whatever container they came from and then busies himself somewhere out of sight. The Joker probes the hole in his mouth with his tongue.

The man returns with a pair of scissors. He cuts down the front of the Joker’s shirt, baring his chest. There is a knife taped to the Joker’s side. The man takes it off, then runs his hands up the Joker’s sides and under his back to check for more weapons. He finds one more and studies them both, then puts one on the edge of the table. He keeps the other.

“I’m not even going to ask you if you regret what you did,” the man says, climbing up onto the table again. “This isn’t about regret. This is just about removing a criminal from the world.”

He weighs the Joker’s blade in his hand, then presses the flat of the blade against his chest, studying it. The expression of mild amusement drains from his face again and his eyes are dark. He leans down and drags his tongue across the Joker’s nipple, then takes the whole thing in his mouth and sucks. When he draws away again, his breathing has become quick. The Joker’s cock is slowly taking an interest in the proceedings, thickening against his thigh.

“You want to fuck me,” the Joker says.

The man’s eyes snap up to his in an almost startled expression, as if he had said something out loud that he hadn’t meant to. The Joker pushes his hips up a little, pushing against the man, and the man looks down between them, obviously feeling the Joker’s arousal. He swallows and then reaches down, his hand closing over the Joker’s erection.

It’s almost as if that evidence of the Joker’s interest has flipped a switch in his head. He yanks the Joker’s pants open, setting his cock free, then fumbles with his own pants. The Joker shifts up to his elbows as far as the restrains will allow him to move, twisting his wrists. His fingers close on the discarded knife.

The man wraps his hand around both of their cocks and draws his hand from base to tip, groaning. He closes his hand around the two cocks again and then thrusts into his own fist. The table creaks slightly. The Joker tips back his head, half-closing his eyes. He digs the knife into the nylon cord, although the hot pleasure of the man’s hand on him is distracting.

The man leans in and kisses the Joker again and the Joker willingly opens his mouth to it, letting the man explore him with his tongue, finding the place where the tooth is missing. The man’s eyes are closed, his eyelashes dark against his skin.

The nylon cord snaps, releasing the tension on his wrists. Now just his ankles are attached to the table. The Joker bucks his hips up into the man’s grip and the man groans. It is almost too much, and if the Joker waits much longer, he won’t be capable of coherent thought. He tightens his grip around the knife and swings it up.

His intention is to sheath the whole knife in the side of the man’s neck, cutting out one carotid artery and the windpipe on the way. The man has lightning-fast reflexes, however, and something warns him. He knocks the Joker’s arm out of the way, rearing back. The Joker hangs onto the knife and brings it up again but the man rolls off the table admirably quickly.

The Joker sits up, going for the cord at his ankles. He is painfully hard but he tries to ignore it. The man wraps an arm around the Joker’s neck from behind and yanks him hard just as the cord around his ankles snaps. They both fall to the floor. The Joker slams his elbow into the man’s side. The man’s arm is tight, cutting off the blood flow to his brain. His vision is already fading. He slams his elbow back again, then jams the knife into the man’s arm around his neck. The man lets go.

The Joker scrambles away, holding his pants up with one hand. The man is on his feet and running for his tray of tools. The Joker staggers into a wall of plastic and slashes a hole in it.

Something bites into his back and he is electrified again, screaming, the knife dropping from his fingers. He collapses to the ground. The man shoves the taser in his pocket and comes at him, his face twisted in fury, his arm dripping blood. The Joker tries to squirm away but his limbs won’t obey him.

The man grabs his hair and yanks him up to his knees, trying to drag him back to the table. The prongs of the taser are still sticking out of the Joker’s back. He closes his fingers around them and pulls them out, then jams them into the man’s thigh. He reaches up to the man’s pocket where the taser is and triggers it.

The man drops to the ground, letting go of the Joker’s hair. The Joker staggers to his feet, crashing into the table, then stumbles for the plastic wall.

He tears down plastic as he goes and makes it to the stairwell before he hears the man start to come after him. The Joker shoves open the door to the stairwell and starts down the stairs, holding the railing and moving as fast as he can without tripping.

He makes it out through the door of the stairwell and into the foyer. At the glass doors, he glances back but sees no one. The Joker shoves through the glass doors and out into the fenced-in lot, through the unlocked gate, and onto the street.

He makes it half a block before he drops to his knees, his legs unwilling to take him any further. He doesn’t look over his shoulder to see if the man is following. A car pulls up to the curve beside him and a door opens.

“I think we found him,” says a police officer.

##

This is nothing like the last time the Joker was in custody in the police station. For one thing, they give him coffee. For another, they treat his wounds rather than inflicting them.

They want to talk about the killer. By the time the police had searched the place, the man was gone and had taken his equipment with him. There was nothing left there but the Joker’s blood and a lot of torn plastic.

Of course, he can’t describe the man to them. He wore a mask. He was roughly the same height as the Joker, maybe more muscular. He had nice teeth. Now he has one extra.

After two hours, the police leave him with his coffee in the interrogation room, where the mirrors reflect his face back at him. He is wearing some old, worn GCPD sweats since his own clothes were torn, and he can appreciate the irony.

The door opens and Commissioner Gordon comes in, looking wary. He gives the Joker a small nod.

“They tell me you saw the killer,” he says.

The Joker has told them everything he knows, so he doesn’t respond. Gordon studies him for a moment.

“We think he might try to attack you again,” Gordon says. “For now, we’re going to put you in protective custody.”

“Where?” the Joker asks.

A shadow moves behind Gordon. Batman steps into the room, his face impassive. The Joker hasn’t seen him in three years and it seems as though the man has not changed in the slightest. He straightens up.

“You’ll be safe,” Gordon says.

##

Some time in the three years since the Joker saw Batman last, he had acquired a tank just like the last one. He insists on blindfolding and handcuffing the Joker before letting him get inside, perhaps to keep him from pressing any buttons and setting off missiles or whatever.

They drive for a long time. The engine rumbles and the Joker can hear Batman’s suit creak as he moves to shift. Slowly, they leave the sounds of the city behind and head into a more residential area.

Finally there is no sound of cars at all, and then the Joker hears a waterfall. The tank accelerates and then lurches forward. There is a brief second of weightlessness and then they hit the ground again, the engine echoing off walls around them. Batman brings the tank to a stop.

For one long moment, they sit in silence. The Joker shifts in his seat, trying to push the blindfold off his eyes, although his hands are cuffed behind his back. He hears the creak as Batman reaches out to him and then a gauntleted hand cups the back of his head. He waits for Batman to untie his blindfold, but it doesn’t happen.

“We weren’t finished,” says the killer.

The Joker tries to twist away but the killer’s hand clenches in his hair. He hears Batman shift in his seat and then his other hand grabs the Joker’s head and they’re kissing roughly. The Joker’s body’s reaction is dizzying; he’s immediately as hard as he had been before.

“You—” he gasps out when their mouths disengage. “You’re not—”

“I told you we’d met,” the killer says. The killer finds the Joker’s cock and palms it. The Joker pushes up into his hand with a groan.

The seat creaks as Batman moves around again. He wraps a hand around one of the Joker’s thighs, dragging him roughly up onto the seat so his back it to the side door, then drags the GCPD sweats that the Joker is wearing all the way down to his knees.

There is hardly any room at all to move around in the tank. The air is hot and smells of sweat. The Joker isn’t quite sure how to get out of the tank and isn’t sure if he could figure it out even without being blindfolded and handcuffed, but at the moment he doesn’t care. That point that he was trying to avoid before, the so-turned-on-he-was-no-longer-coherent point, well, he’s long past that. There are more sounds of Batman’s costume moving and then suddenly a hot, hard cock is against his own. He jerks at the sensation. A gloved hand drags his thighs further apart and then a finger is behind his balls, pressing forcefully against his asshole and not giving him much room for argument. It slides in, and then the second and third fingers come after it. He forces his body to relax around the fingers, then winces when they are abruptly removed.

The spit-slicked cock that replaces them pushes inside him slowly and relentlessly. It hurts and he finds himself holding his breath for the minute it takes to adjust. When he is all the way inside, Batman goes still, his hands on the Joker’s hips.

A hand brushes his cheek and then yanks the blindfold off his eyes. Batman’s face is inches away from his own, his body pressing down heavily on top of him. The Joker’s cock twitches, achingly hard.

Batman pulls his hips back, sliding nearly all the way out, then pushes forward again, shoving the Joker against the door of the tank. They both make noises when Batman slams home for the second time. And then Batman pulls out and does it again, and again, and the Joker tries to bring his hips up to meet him, and in just a little while they are slamming together desperately, the Joker’s ankles locked behind Batman’s back.

Batman pounds him into the door of the tank, his face pressed against the Joker’s jaw, the hard ridge of his mask digging into his cheek. The Joker’s cock drags against the front of Batman’s costume and then suddenly the pleasure spills over and he is coming on the cock inside him so hard he can’t see, his hips stuttering up, his heels digging into Batman’s back. His breath saws in his throat and he can’t stop himself from making noises. Batman keeps going mercilessly, fucking him through his orgasm for another minute before letting go inside of him.

Batman collapses on top of him and they catch their breath together as quiet returns to the cabin of the tank. Out the windshield, the Joker can see a craggy underground cavern.

Finally Batman pulls out of him and sits up. The Joker watches him rearrange his costume, buckling the front of it back into place. Batman pulls the Joker’s sweats back up and the Joker lifts his hips to help him. When they are in place, Batman hits the switch on the door and the driver’s side gull wing door opens.

He gets out, then grabs the Joker’s ankle and pulls him out as well, grabbing his bound arms and forcing him down onto his knees on the ground. The Joker raises his head and looks up into the ceiling, where bats are nestled in pockets of stone. Batman squats down behind him, one arm wrapped around his neck. A knife presses against the Joker’s neck just under his ear.

“It’s not about regret,” the killer says. Unlike before, his voice is suddenly uncertain. “It’s about removing a criminal from the world.”

The bats shift and resettle in the ceiling. The Joker lowers his head, feeling the knife press into his neck. The engine of the tank ticks as it cools.

“You were the reason I started doing this,” Batman says.

The Joker doesn’t reply. He feels the forehead of the mask rest against this back of his neck.

Batman takes a breath. “Gotham’s different now. I don't know where to go from here. I don’t know how to make them pay attention again.”

The Joker twists around a little. Batman raises his head and meets his gaze.

“I can show you,” the Joker says.


End file.
